


Take Flight

by storiesfortravellers



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M, Softer Side of Tony, Steve Rogers & Sam Wilson Friendship, Tech Geekery, Wings, chef, flirtation, reference to canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-13
Updated: 2014-06-13
Packaged: 2018-02-04 12:21:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1778953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storiesfortravellers/pseuds/storiesfortravellers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony thinks of upgrades he could make to Sam's wings. Upgrades lead to other things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Take Flight

People thought there must be something wrong with Sam, going all the way to LA for maintenance. And it's not like he could fly there himself, or even take a commercial flight since they wouldn't take giant metal wings as carry on for some reason. So he always had to hitch a ride with some military flight.

It was worth the hassle, though, to get upgrades from Tony Stark.

They had met, of course, in the air. Steve had heard that Tony was in some trouble and headed over, and Sam went too. Falcon flew up next to Iron Man and took out one of the drones attacking him, and he could hear Tony yell "What the hell are you?"

It was a fun moment.

When the battle was won, they all decided to go out for Cuban sandwiches (at some great food truck that Happy had started on the side). Clint and Natasha had shown up too, so it was a reunion of sorts for the others.

They sat in the park to eat, and before Sam could even introduce himself, Tony had started touching the wings and saying, "I’ve just got to get a better look at what you got back here."

Sam turned around and smirked. 

"I didn't mean it like -- you know what, never mind, I meant it both ways," Tony said, and they both laughed. 

"Seriously, though, what is this, dual pathway propulsion?" Tony asked.

"Good eye. That's the cooling system down there, and here's the power boost. The most advanced piece of engineering is right here, the navigation balance."

"Ooh," Tony said, in a voice most men reserved for pornography and beer. "So the propellant goes right through the other systems?"

At that point, Steve and the others had rolled their eyes at the tech talk and started their own little conversation about the plantains they were eating. Tony continued to ask questions, and Sam was enjoying the chance to talk about the wings.

At some point, Tony asked Sam if he would consider letting Tony tinker with them.

"Are you serious? Do I want _Tony Stark_ to upgrade my wings? Hell, yes."

"Don't do it," Clint joked, "You'll end up with like a mini-nuclear reactor in your socks and 300 tiny screens in your goggles."

"My upgrades are awesome," Tony said dismissively, then turned back to Sam. "Come by my workshop tomorrow?"

"Sure," Sam said with a grin. 

"Be careful," Steve muttered as he finished off his sandwich and licked his fingers.

"Who should be careful?" Tony asked, "Him?"

"Both of you." Steve gave them both a smirk.

\--

Sam had heard a lot of things about Tony (everyone in the world had heard a lot of things about Tony Stark). Steve had told him that Tony wasn’t exactly what his reputation suggested, and Sam respected Tony’s commitment to keeping the power of the Iron Man suits in his reach, even though most of his military colleagues didn’t like his refusal to sell suits to the military. But after meeting him, Sam could see why at least some of the reputation was true: Tony did seem hyperactive, completely uninterested in propriety or other people’s boundaries, and almost always ready to leap before looking. He was brash, bold, and more impulsive than Sam was used to. And yes, Tony was as intelligent and charming as Sam had heard too.

But when Sam came to his workshop, Tony seemed like he was in a slightly lower gear. Maybe less adrenaline. Or maybe his work calmed him; Sam knew a number of vets who found their first hint of tranquility in their work, whether fixing cars or designing computer systems or writing books or drawing or, in his own case, working as a peer therapist.

Tony asked Sam to put on the wings, since he would need to see how they functioned with his body. Sam felt oddly comforted by this; it always felt strange, watching as some mechanic plopped down his wings on some table as if they meant nothing to him, as if they weren’t literally the thing holding him up most days.

Tony opened the various doors and poked around the wings, occasionally gently shifting Sam’s body where he needed it to go. The process felt odd, but not in a bad way. Like a doctor’s appointment but not for his own body.

Tony had questions for Sam, about the wings and their design, about past problems he had had, but also about what it felt like to fly, what situations made him feel free and what made him feel constrained, what improvements he wished for, and what aspects of the wings were most important for him to keep the same. Sam could see the technical relevance of the questions, but they felt personal, somehow. He had never talked about how it felt to fly, and it was exhilarating in a way to finally give it voice.

Tony smiled and talked about how it felt to fly in the suit. Sam got the impression that Tony didn’t tell many people that either.

When they talked about safety improvements, Sam mentioned a series of minor issues before finally working up the resolve to talk about Riley. It wasn’t a suit malfunction, and he wasn’t sure that anything could be done to avoid what had happened, but he figured he should mention it.

Tony listened, closely, pausing his tinkering and sitting down to watch Sam tell the story. He nodded, and didn’t look at Sam with pity. He just said, “I’m really sorry about your friend, Sam. Let me think about it for the next upgrade and I’ll see what I can do.”

There were only a handful of people in the world that Sam had told the story of the last moment seeing Riley, of what he looked like, a falling flame, of what that moment felt like. It was strange, to tell Tony so soon, but he had decided by then that he trusted the man, and the truth just kind of fell out.

Sam asked him some other technical questions then, and Tony answered them. He talked about the changes he wanted to make, explaining the science behind each of his ideas thoroughly. It was advanced stuff; Sam had taken aeronautical engineering in school, but this was heady even for him, but Tony’s explanations were very clear. He seemed to want Sam to understand every upgrade so he would know what he was doing when he gave Tony permission to make it. It seemed unusually considerate, and Sam guessed that Tony understood (identified with) how attached Sam was to his wings, how protective he was even.

After Sam agreed, Tony made the adjustments. Sam took the wings off to give better access, and Tony gestured for Sam to stand over the wings right next to him so he could see everything Tony was doing, and so Tony could show him how to make field repairs to the upgrades if he ever needed to. Sam was impressed by how gentle Tony was with the technology, how thorough he was in double checking every alteration. It was nice to find someone who seemed to care as much about his wings as he did.

When they were done, Sam put the wings back on so they could test them. Sam didn’t want to fly in such a small space, but Tony insisted.

The moment Sam started to move, he inhaled sharply. He wasn’t worried about the small space any more. He could tell that the wings’ precision and braking had improved immensely. 

He grinned, flew a few small circles around the workshop, then landed in front of Tony, almost out of breath from the rush of trying out his wings. 

“You can say that I’m spectacular,” Tony said. “It’s okay, I know you want to.”

“Your ego is spectacular.”

“Still counts.”

Sam laughed then, and leaned forward, without thinking, and kissed him.

Tony looked surprised, confused, and Sam wondered if he should apologize. But then Tony collected himself and kissed Sam, harder, hotter, pulling Sam’s body closer to his.

When they parted, they were both out of breath.

“You know, I was thinking,” Tony said.

“Yeah?”

“You should really come back here for regular maintenance on the wings. Regularly.”

“How regularly?”

“From a technical standpoint, every 6 months for safety checks. But if you have the time, you could come more often. You know, only if you wanted to.”

“I have a couple weekends off a month.” Sam smiled. It was cute the way that Tony seemed almost nervous.

“That would make the upgrade process much smoother,” Tony said with a grin.

They leaned forward and kissed again, and Sam couldn’t help but smile again as he ran his hand over Tony's waist and heard Tony moan.

**Author's Note:**

> For this prompt at comment-fic on livejournal:  
> MCU, Sam / or + any, proud of his wings


End file.
